Archive for October, 2013

This book teaches you the tools available in AutoCAD Civil 3D 2014 to work with GIS data. You need to understand how leveraging GIS data can enhance your civil engineering design efforts, while satisfying the ever increasing requests to provide it at the end of design process.

Each lesson contains concepts, principles and exercises to provide you with the background and foundation of knowledge that you need to effectively apply these features directly to your job tasks. You work through real world exercises to reinforce your understanding of incorporating GIS data into common tasks that other Civil Engineering and Surveying professionals are performing in the workplace every day.

Some might have a bit of a hard time getting their manhole labels to display correctly in profile view. This will take you step-by-step in setting your label style to label your manholes 90°, at the bottom of the profile view.

Not very appealing. Even if you drag the labels off the manholes, they still don’t look very good.

Yes, you can altar the label style to be 90° and have the dragged state’s leader set to False, and drag each one to the bottom of the profile view, then try and get them lined up nice and neat. But, that’s not very proficient. What if the profile view height changes? You will then need to drag them, one-by-one to the new location.

I am going to walk you through the steps to get the label to be exactly at the bottom of the profile view grid and if the profile view height changes, they move with the profile view to the correct location.

First, keep in mind, most people use the same label style for the plan view and the profile view. To do this correctly, you must have a label style for the plan, and one for the profile.

We will start by copying a label style and then altering it…

Under the Information tab, make sure you rename it to something like Data with Connected Pipes (Storm)(Profile). Now click the Layout tab. Change the rotation for only the Structure Text componentto 90°.

Under the General section, change the Anchor Point to Structure Dimension…

Now click on the Dragged State tab. We are only changing these parameters just in case you do need to drag the labels. If you look at the first image at the top of the page, you can see that I have a pipe crossing the street. The labels are on top of each other. Even by creating these labels in this fashion, they are still going to be on top of each other.

Under the Leader category, change the Visibility to False. Under the Dragged State Components category, change the Display to As Composed…

Click OK.

Make sure if you dragged the labels, and they are in a “dragged state”, that you reset them. You can right-click on a label and choose Reset Label. Also, change all your text to the new label style you just created.

Notice the labels jump way down below the grid…

Not to worry, this is normal. Select your newly created labels, then open Properties. Under the General section, for Dimension Anchor Option, choose Graph view bottom…

Now your labels are in the correct location.

You can go a step further in your label style to have it add a line to the label connecting it to the structure. That is going to have to be another day.

Using the Create Best Fit Alignment command no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Corridor Design

Importing a subassembly that exists in a folder with a long path no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Setting an override from True to False for a parameter in the Corridor Section Parameter Editor when the Corridor Section Editor viewports are configured to display multiple viewports no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Surface profiles that are generated from a data-referenced corridor surface and a data-referenced alignment (using the data shortcuts feature) are now dynamic.

The application no longer closes unexpectedly when you are working in a drawing with the Corridor Section Editor open and you then open (or create) and then close another drawing.

Importing a subassembly when a Tool Palette is not displayed no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly. To import a subassembly to a Tool Palette, the Tool Palette must first be open. If no Tool Palette is open, the option to import the subassembly to a Tool Palette is not available for selection.

Attaching another subassembly to a LinktoMarkpoint subassembly that exists in an offset assembly no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

3D polylines that exist in the drawing no longer appear by default in the Corridor Section Editor.

Importing a subassembly to a Tool Palette and then re-importing the same subassembly no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

When you create a subassembly from a polyline, the behavior of the Link Creation setting now works as expected.

Corridor feature lines that are drawn at fixed offset distances now appear as expected in the drawing.

Section Views

The positions of volume tables are now maintained when a drawing containing them is saved, closed, and reopened.

General/Other

Stability when using a menu with a drop down list has been improved.

Using Ctrl+Tab to switch between open drawings while the Layer Manager is open no longer causes the application to display an error message and close unexpectedly.

Opening a drawing that was created in AutoCAD Civil 3D 2013 (or in an earlier version) that contains data references no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Selecting points within the Point Editor and then clicking in the Style column no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Importing profile view band styles now works as expected.

Creating feature lines from a large number of polylines no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Grip editing a feature line after using the feature line Fillet command and then using the UNDO command no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Using the ExportToAutoCAD command on a drawing that has an attached xref no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Using the APPLOAD command to load AeccCustomDraw.dbx, AeccCustomEvent.dbx and AeccCustomUI.dbx now works as expected.

The geographic location is now correct when the units in the drawing are different from the units in the Geographic Location dialog box.

Starting the application after uninstalling AutoCAD® Map 3D 2010 no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Labels

Values are now rounded correctly in profile station labels that use station index format with rounding.

Autodesk AutoCAD Map 3D Integration

Live Map Data tiles are now loaded correctly when opening the application.

The MAPIMPORT command now imports SHP and SDF files as expected.

Object Enabler

Using the eTransmit command in Autodesk® AutoCAD® or Autodesk® AutoCAD LT® when the Civil Object Enabler is installed no longer causes the program to close unexpectedly.

Drawings that contain alignments, profiles, and pressure networks that are created in the current version of the program and then saved in an earlier version of the program now open as expected in AutoCAD (or other object-enabled program) when the Civil Object Enabler is installed.

Parcels

Running the Parcel Map Check report no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Using the Delete PI command on a parcel segment point of intersection no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Editing a parcel segment by holding the Ctrl key down and moving a grip no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Pipes

Deleting a pipe or structure when the Toolspace window is hidden no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

On the Microsoft® Windows 8® operating system, if you display a rollover tooltip for a pipe network and then exit the application, the application no longer closes unexpectedly.

Changing a pipe network part in the source file of a data shortcut now updates the part style in the referenced pipe network as expected.

Inserting a custom part into a pipe network now works as expected.

Using the Batch Import command to import pipe network parts into the Content Catalog Editor now works as expected.

The accuracy of the Part Builder Data Structure Table has been improved.

The structure style block rotation is now aligned with the 3D solid.

Pressure Networks

When using the Follow Surface command, the application no longer closes unexpectedly if the reference surface for the pressure network has a gap in it.

Profiles

Using the Profile Layout Tools toolbar no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Profile Views

Pressure network parts can now be re-drawn in profile view after drawing them in profile view and deleting them.

Points

Adding points to a table, using the UNDO command, and then selecting the table no longer causes the application to become unresponsive.

The Convert Land Desktop Points command now uses the Preserve Original Point Layer setting.

Point Clouds

The Window selection option in the Add Points to Surface command now works as expected.

Creating a point cloud or a surface from an ESRI ASC file now works as expected.

Attaching an RCP or RCS point cloud to the drawing and then adding AutoCAD Civil 3D properties to the point cloud now works as expected.

Project Manager

Extra .map files are no longer created when importing a Vault project.

Quantity Takeoff

Adding, removing, and then re-adding a point file to a surface definition no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Subassembly Composer

Void areas in corridor subassemblies are now displayed as expected in cross section views.

Surfaces

Surface analysis colors defined from color books are no longer converted to index colors for rendering in model space.

Surface analysis data is now maintained after the surface is rebuilt.

Surface analysis values that are outside of the defined ranges no longer appear as white in the drawing.

Switching to a different layout when the Level of Detail mode is active no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

If a DEM file that is added as surface data does not contain coordinate system information, the coordinate system that you assign when adding the DEM file is now used for the surface.

DEM files inserted as raster images are now positioned correctly.

Polylines created with the Water Drop command now use the PLINEGEN system variable.

Using the Paste Surface command no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Survey

Exploding a large number of survey figures, and then copying and pasting the entities into another drawing, no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

The Logging Enabled setting (under Change Reporting) is now included when the survey database settings are saved to an external file.

Importing a LandXML file with an invalid data format no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Creating a new survey database after importing survey database settings from a file no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Traverses are now inserted into the drawing with the expected rotation angle.

Importing a field book file when the drawing coordinate system and survey database coordinate system are different no longer causes the application to close unexpectedly.

Importing a field book without having a network selected first will no longer cause the application to close unexpectedly.

Coordinate values are now created correctly when importing a Face 1 and Face 2 reciprocal observation field book file.